Dishonesty
'Chapter I' "He was an adept at this sort of work, and knew well how to review such a book as Lady Carbury's 'Criminal Queens,' without bestowing much trouble on the reading. He could almost do it without cutting the book, so that its value for purposes of after sale might not be injured. And yet Mr. Booker was an honest man, and had set his face persistently against many literary malpractices. Stretched-out type, insufficient lines, and the French habit of meandering with a few words over an entire page, had been rebuked by him with conscientious strenght. He was supposed to be rather an Aristides among reviewers. But circumstanced as he was he could not oppose himself altogether to the usages of the time. 'Bad; of course it is bad,' he said to a young friend who was working with him on his periodical. 'Who doubts that? How many very bad things are there that we do! But if we were to attempt to reform all our bad ways at once, we should never do any good thing. I am not strong enough to put the world straight, and I doubt if you are'" (12). #Writing as Business #Dishonesty 'Chapter II' “When he [ Sir Felix Carbury ] talked of love, he not only thought that he was talking nonsense, but showed that he thought so” (22-23). #dishonesty #Seduction 'Chapter IX' Fisker has “brilliantly printed programmes . . . with gorgeous maps, and beautiful little pictures of trains running into tunnels beneath snowy mountains and coming out of them on the margin of sunlit lakes,” but Paul finds that “Mr. Fisker seemed to be indifferent whether the railway should ever be constructed or not. It was clearly his idea that fortunes were to be made out of the concern before a spadeful of earth had been moved” (72). #Dishonesty Since Paul is reluctant to write Melmotte about the railway, Fisker says: “I’ll write it, and you can sign it” (73). He writes the following letter: “I have the pleasure of informing you that my partner Mr. Fisker, -- of Fisker, Montague, and Montague, of San Francisco, -- is now in London with the view of allowing British capitalists to assist in carrying out perhaps the greatest work of the age, -- namely, the South Central Pacific and Mexican Railway, which is to give direct communication between San Francisco and the Gulf of Mexico. He is very anxious to see you upon his arrival, as he is aware that your co-operation would be desirable. We feel assured that with your matured judgment in such matters you would see at once the magnificence of the enterprise. If you will name a day and an hour, Mr. Fisker will call upon you. “I have to thank you and Madame Melmotte for a very pleasing evening spent at your house last week. “Mr. Fisker proposes returning to New York. I shall remain here, superintending the British interests which may be involved” (73-74). #Dishonesty #Letters Mr. Fisker tells Melmotte “his account of the Great South Central Pacific and Mexican Railway, and exhibited considerable skill by telling it all in comparatively few words. And yet he was gorgeous and florid” (75-76) #Dishonesty #Facility with Language “As Mr. Melmotte read the documents, Fisker from time to time put in a word. But the words had no reference at all to the future profits of the railway or to the benefit which such means of communication would confer upon the world at large; but applied solely to the appetite for such stock as theirs, which might certainly be produced in the speculating world by a proper manipulation of the affairs” (76). #Dishonesty #Facility with Language #Empty Words/Papers Fisker convinces Melmotte that it’s not necessary to back the railway stock with real money: ““There would be such a mass of stock!’ ‘You have to back that with a certain amount of paid-up capital?’ ‘We take care, sir, in the West not to cripple commerce too closely by old-fashioned bandages” (77). #Dishonesty #Empty Words/Papers 'Chapter XI' Mr. Booker is disappointed that he should have “to descend so low in literature,” without realizing that he is making a choice, and that he could choose “to starve, honestly, if no other honest mode of carrying on his career was open to him” (90-91). However, he pacifies himself by saying that someone else would do what he was doing if he wasn’t doing it (91). #Press #Writing as Business #Dishonesty “But the review in the ‘Morning Breakfast Table’ was the making of Lady Carbury ’s book, as far as it ever was made” (91). His review claimed “It was the very book that had been wanted for years,” and that it was “a work of infinite research and brilliant imagination combined” (91). #Press #Writing as Business #Dishonesty Mr. Alf claims that he has no control over what his reviewers say about the books, but Lady Carbury “thought rightly, that Mr. Alf ’s Mr. Jones had taken direct orders from his editor, as to his treatment of the ‘Criminal Queens’” (96). #Writing as Business #Press #Dishonesty 'Chapter XV' “A quarter of an hour later the Caversham servant was on his way home with two letters, -- the one from Roger expressing his regret that he could not accept Lady Pomona ’s invitation, and the other from Lady Carbury declaring that she and her son and daughter would have great pleasure in dining at Caversham on the Monday” (128). #Proximity #Dishonesty 'Chapter XVI' “Lady Carbury assured him [ Roger ] that she was never dull when left alone with books” (129). #WomenReading#Dishonesty 'Chapter XVII' “She [ Marie Melmotte ] longed to be told by him that he loved her. He [ Sir Felix Carbury ] had no objection to tell her so, but, without thinking much about it, felt it to be a bore” . . . . “‘Do you really love me well enough,’ she whispered. ‘Of course I do. I’m bad at making pretty speeches, and all that, but you know I love you.’ ‘Do you?’ ‘By George, yes. I always liked you from the first moment I saw you. I did indeed.’ It was a poor declaration of love, but it sufficed” (146). #Facility with Language #Seduction #Dishonesty 'Chapter XVIII' Felix promises to come back and see Ruby the next week: “As he made the promise he resolved that he would not keep it. He would write to her again, and bid her come to him in London, and would send her money for the journey” (153). #Letters #Seduction #Dishonesty Ruby and Felix lying in the copse half a mile from Sheep’s Acre Farm: “She had her London lover beside her; and though in every word he spoke there was a tone of contempt, still he talked of love, and made her promises, and told her that she was pretty. He probably did not enjoy it much; he cared very little about her, and carried on the liaison simply because it was the proper sort of thing for a young man to do” (153). #Seduction #Dishonesty 'Chapter XXV' “She [ Georgiana ] had written to her dear friend Lady Monogram , whom she had known intimately as Miss Triplex, and whose marriage with Sir Damask Monogram had been splendid preferment, telling how she had been kept down in Suffolk at the time of her friend’s last party, and how she had been driven to consent to return to London as the guest of Madame Melmotte . She hoped her friend would not throw her off on that account. She had been very affectionate, with a poor attempt at fun, and rather humble. Goergiana Longestaffe had never been humble before; but the Monograms were people so much thought of and in such an excellent set! She would do anything rather than lose the Monograms. But it was of no use. She had been humble in vain, for Lady Monogram had not even answered her note” (206). #Letters #Dishonesty #Premeditation